Tami was on the phone, and she was very upset. In fact she sounded like she was about to cry. "Do you know anybody named Shannon?" she asked.

"I have a niece named Shannon in St Louis" I replied. "Why?"

"Because there are some messages on my phone for 'Steve' from someone named 'Shannon'. And Pedro erased the messages as soon as he found them. It's really suspicious. Look, I'm trying real hard not to cry right now but if I need to could I come to your place after work?"

I told her "sure" and we rang off. It was about an hour before quitting time.

I'd given Amy fifteen bucks in the morning to buy minutes for my cell phone, and she was supposed to meet me with the PIN number at lunch. She didn't show. I'd left a message on Tami's machine asking that if Amy called or came by to have her get hold of me, as I only had 3 minutes left and needed to know if I had to get minutes myself or if she had.

Tami called back twenty minutes later. Amy had been by and had gone to work and she'd give me the fifteen bucks when she got off. Tami was very very upset, crying. "I called the number from the answering machine back and asked her to describe 'Steve' and she said he was Spanish," she sobbed. "She's a crack whore, Pedro's buying hookers. Please come get me when you get off work. I don't think he knows I busted him, I kept a straight face. I don't know how I did it."

Stupidly unable to refuse a damsel in distress, even one whose husband calls "Lucifer", I agreed. "When you get here come on up and have a couple of shots with me." So When I got off work I drove over to pick her up. She handed me a nearly empty whiskey bottle and sipped from a coffee cup. "Do you have a shot glass?" I asked. "No, she replied, "I'm using this coffee cup, just use the bottle."

I stood there sipping cheap whiskey from a nearly empty pint bottle while she stuffed things in a valise. We went down and got in the car. I'd planned on buying cat litter and phone minutes and repaying twenty I owed Ralph. Ralph was the first stop, but his car wasn't there. So I got minutes and a six pack and more whiskey and Tami talked me out of going to get cat litter. We went home and drank until it was past my bed time, and I went to bed. She was still sitting at the table crying. I'd wanted to stay up until Amy got off work and felt bad about leaving her alone in such distress, but I had an alarm clock that was going to be very annoying before the sun came up.

The sounds of arguing woke me up. I got out of bed, put on my bathrobe and went in the living room to see what the commotion was all about. Tami's husband was there, walking around my house peeking into every nook and cranny. "Where my document?" He demanded.

Tami told me she'd cracked the door to tell him "go away" and he'd pushed his way in. She told him she didn't know anything about any documents and yelled at him about the whore he'd been fucking. "I have work in the morning" I told him calmly. "I think you'd better leave."

"You gonna die!" he yelled.

"Everybody dies" I replied calmly. "Now get the hell out of my house!"

"I not leaving until I get my document!" he repeated. I asked "what document?" Tami said "Documents. I think he's talking about his passport and shit." She turned to her husband. "Look motherfucker, the only documents I have are your goddamned fake social security number papers and god damn it cocksucker I'm using them to send your sorry ass back to Peru!"

"Get out of my house," I told him again, "before I call the police."

"Go ahead, call the police!" he exclamed. "I tell them you be smoking drug. I want my document!"

I grabbed the phone, called 911 and reported a home invasion. The police were there within five minutes, to their credit. When Tami's husband saw the police car he went outside. A young policeman came to the door and I let him in, hoping I had put the bong away.

He took some information, and went outside and told the Peruvian he had to leave. The stupid alien argued with the two police officers; I could hear much of the conversation. The policewoman's voice was stern and harsh; he was lucky there had been no violence. He almost got himself put in jail anyway.

I turned out the lights and went back to bed to the sound of the alien invader arguing with the policewoman about drugs. "You can't even keep your story straight" she said, the last thing I heard before dropping off to sleep again.

No sooner, it seemed, had I gone back to sleep when Tami woke me up again. My phone had rang and it was Amy needing a ride from work to her car, which was at Tami's. She'd called Tami's apartment and Tami's husband had answered, saying Tami was asleep and he'd go to pick her up at work.

But unknown to him, Amy had talked to his prostitute as well and knew that there was little chance that Tami would be there; she knew she'd be at my house and had dialed hers unthinkingly. I got dressed and we drove to the cab company to pick up Amy. Tami's husband's car was leaving as we pulled up.

"That God damned cocksucker!" Amy exclaimed as she got in the car. "I told him I wasn't riding with him but the son of a bitch showed up anyway, screaming about some damned documents as if I belonged to him or something. At my work! And I'm already in trouble with them!" She swore she was going to have her six foot five inches tall boyfriend kick the five foot five Peruvian's ass. She gave me the fifteen dollars back.

We got home and Amy wanted alcohol, having been sober in her taxicab. I told her we'd polished off the beer and whiskey and reefer, and she wanted me to take her to a 3:00 bar. I glanced at the clock; the three oclock bars would be closing in forty minutes, and if I said "no" I'd be arguing with her at least that long.

So we went to Third Base, which smelled like vomit. We didn't stay 'til closing, thankfully.

As I write this I'm tired as all hell. I hope I get some sleep tonight.